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A Wrinkle in Time/Transcript
Transcript Text reads: The Mysteries of Life with Tim and Moby A boy, Tim, is watering his vegetable garden. A robot, Moby, materializes out of thin air. He floats above the ground in the lotus position. TIM: Hey, where did you come from? Moby falls. Dust rises as he hits the ground. His head is resting on a squash. TIM: You're squishing the squash. Moby hands Tim a piece of paper. Tim reads from a typed letter. TIM: Dear Tim and Moby, I heard A Wrinkle in Time is about intergalactic travel. Can you tell me about their spaceship and what planets they visit? From, Kyle. TIM: A Wrinkle in Time is a pretty far-out book. It was written by Madeleine L'Engle and published in nineteen sixty-two. An image shows Madeleine L'Engle. TIM: The novel follows Meg and her brother Charles Wallace as they try to find their missing father. An image shows a teenage girl holding her little brother's hand in a park after dark. MOBY: Beep. TIM: They're guided by three mystical beings: Missus Whatsit, Missus Who, and Missus Which. An animation shows the three characters: Missus Whatsit, Missus Who, and Missus Which. TIM: The Misses introduce them to a concept they call the tesseract. It lets them travel instantly from galaxy to galaxy. An animation shows the three characters standing in the park behind Meg and Charles Wallace. Missus Whatsit holds up her hand, and a box forms around all of them. Then the box disappears. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Well, imagine space as a piece of fabric. Tim holds a piece of red cloth. TIM: We humans are like an ant on its surface. If we want to get from point A to point B, we have to travel on top of the fabric. An ant crawls across the cloth, from point A on one side to point B on the other. TIM: But the Misses exist in a higher dimension. They can observe the fabric of space from the outside, and fold it. The fabric bunches up, putting points A and B right next to each other. TIM: So they can travel from one star to another without even moving. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Exactly. That's where the title comes from. The tesseract wrinkles time and space. It helps Meg and Charles look for their dad, Mister Murray. An image shows Meg and Charles' father. TIM: Their search takes them, and their friend Calvin, to some strange planets. Along the way they encounter all sorts of aliens and bizarre creatures. An animation shows Charles, Meg, another teen, and the Misses materializing on an alien landscape. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Well, their journey isn't only about exploring the universe. It's more focused on what the characters discover about themselves. That's why Wrinkle is described as a coming-of-age tale. The lessons kids learn as they approach adulthood form a vital part of the story. MOBY: Beep. TIM: One of the hardest parts of being a kid is trying to fit in. Meg is having an especially hard time in school. Kids tease her about her absent father and just for being different. An animation shows Meg walking out the front door of her school. She looks nervous and unhappy. A crowd of students mills around. Some stare at her, and others point and laugh. TIM: Like many teenagers, she's not entirely in control of her emotions. She often wonders why she can't just be like everyone else. Two teenage boys tease Meg. She responds by attacking them physically. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Yeah, it would be pretty scary if we were all exactly the same. That's what the characters discover when they tesser to planet Camazotz. The characters materialize in the middle of a street between two rows of identical houses. TIM: Everyone there is controlled by a mysterious entity known only as "It." They eat, sleep, work, and play at "It's" command. An animation shows smiling children tossing balls upward and catching them in unison. MOBY: Beep. TIM: On the surface, it seems like they're all happy. But that's an illusion: The people actually don't feel anything at all! And if they fall out of line, they suffer the consequences. An animation shows one child dropping his ball on the ground and frowning. TIM: Meg realizes that conformity, trying to be like other people, has its downside. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Yeah. It's boring, but it also stands in the way of personal growth. Meg's experience on Camazotz teaches her about self-reliance. For most of the story, she prays her father will come and save the day. On Camazotz, Meg learns that she's in control of her own life. This self-confidence comes up huge when she finally faces off with It. An animation shows Meg walking up a street of identical houses toward a skyscraper with a sign that reads "It." In front of the identical houses are children all dressed the same, tossing red balls. She catches a red ball and tosses it back to one of the children MOBY: Beep. TIM: I'm not going to ruin the end for everyone, Moby. I can tell you that they visit weirder places than Camazotz. An animation shows Meg and Charles riding on the back of a mythological creature. TIM: Journeys to distant planets mark Wrinkle as a work of science fiction. MOBY: Beep. TIM: That's a writing style, or genre, that explores how new discoveries might affect people and societies. Images show various iconic science-fiction figures, including rockets, a robot, and an alien. TIM: Sci-fi stories often include stuff like time travel and aliens. An animation shows a clock with the hands spinning around, indicating the passage of time, and a green alien with a red eye, touching the clock. ALIEN: Beep. TIM: These otherworldly elements are usually employed to set up an allegory. That's a story that can be interpreted as a message about our own world. The situation on Camazotz presents an allegory about oppressive governments. A split screen shows children on Camazotz tossing red balls up and down, and a giant boot about to stomp on a crowd of people. MOBY: Beep. The children stop tossing the balls and turn to face the giant skyscraper labeled "It." The screen splits to show a menacing figure with red eyes behind a podium delivering a speech in front of a crowd of people. TIM: "It" promised to wipe out war and unhappiness. That pledge was kept, but only at a great cost: Individual freedom. In real life, dictators often sweep into power with similar promises. They take total control by appealing to people's desire for security. And demand complete obedience. The image of the menacing red-eyed figure pans out to show a huge audience of soldiers listening to the speech. TIM: These authoritarian governments live up to few of their promises. And plunge their citizens into years of misery. L'Engle saw this as a threat to any society. Even in a democracy like ours there's always the temptation to give up freedom in exchange for security. An image shows a ballot titled Vote with two checkboxes below it reading Freedom and Security. A hand holding a pencil is deciding which box to check. MOBY: Beep. TIM: In Wrinkle,the threat to political freedom is just the beginning. The people of Camazotz have also given up their free will. That's the ability for individuals to make their own choices. An image shows a human silhouette surrounded by question marks. TIM: It's all part of the master plan of the Dark Thing. It's a shadowy force spreading from planet to planet. Even the Misses are afraid it may take over the whole universe. And Earth lies directly in its path. An animation shows planets being engulfed in a shadow. An image shows a shadowy Earth. TIM: The spread of its darkness is a symbol not just of oppression, but of evil itself. MOBY: Beep. These mystical touches add an element of fantasy to the story That's a genre defined by magic and supernatural events. An image shows an assortment of imaginary creatures, along with characters from the book. TIM: In Wrinkle, a spiritual struggle of good against evil forms the backdrop of all the cool science fiction. Dark forces like "It" seek perfection through logic and order. An animation shows Meg and Charles imprisoned in a jail cell made of numbers and letters. TIM: By the novel's climax, Meg learns that faith and love are much more important. An animation shows the jail cell dissolving. Meg is bathed in light. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Moby, you really have to read it for yourself. The book won the Newberry Medal for achievement in children's literature. It led to four sequels and inspired young readers around the world. An image shows the Newberry Medal. Another image shows a girl reading the book in bed. TIM: One of them was Janice Voss, one of America's most accomplished astronauts. An image shows a female astronaut reading A Wrinkle in Time in a space capsule. TIM: It's hard to believe that A Wrinkle in Time came close to never seeing the light of day. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Some publishers thought a sci-fi book couldn't have a girl as the main character. An image shows the manuscript for A Wrinkle in Time. The manuscript is stamped "Rejected." TIM: Others said it was too complicated for kids, with its tesseracts and time travel. An image shows an editor at his desk reading a manuscript and looking confused. TIM: Boy were they wrong, huh? Tim looks toward Moby but he is gone. TIM: Moby? Moby materializes exactly as he did at the beginning of the video. He is floating in the air, in a lotus positon. TIM: Hey, where did you come from? MOBY: Beep. Just like before, Moby falls. Dust rises as he hits the ground. His head is resting on a squash. TIM: You're squishing the squash. Moby hands Tim a piece of paper. Tim reads from a typed letter. TIM: Dear Tim and... wait a second! Category:BrainPOP Transcripts Category:BrainPOP English Transcripts